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#1502 Jul 11 2018 at 10:10 AM Rating: Excellent
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Well the senate voted 97-2 to say we actually like NATO in a non-binding kind of way. Which is probably a good sign, as many of them will still need to have a career after the orange man is dead and gone.
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#1503 Jul 11 2018 at 10:42 AM Rating: Excellent
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Sure, until Trump decides that we're leaving or pulling troops out of Europe or something. Then the GOP will roll over faster than a dog seeking Milkbones.
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#1504 Jul 11 2018 at 11:13 AM Rating: Decent
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"You all need to double+ your defence spending, I know a guy that sells weapons"
#1505 Jul 11 2018 at 3:04 PM Rating: Decent
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Sure, conservatives can deride liberals for spending other people's money on petty things like social services, but when it comes to sovereign nations...

Edited, Jul 11th 2018 5:05pm by Debalic
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#1506 Jul 11 2018 at 7:17 PM Rating: Good
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I don't have much of a problem with this one. I'm all for the USA getting out of the World Police role. Let other countries start spending more for their own defense.
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#1507 Jul 11 2018 at 8:36 PM Rating: Decent
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It's also incredibly over simplistic to just say you're "for" or "against" NATO. The issue isn't about being against it. it's about all the nations involved actually contributing their share to it. It's always amusing to me when people rail on about how the US spends X amount of money on defense, which is more than <insert number of other countries here combined>, while ignoring that the US pays the lions share of the entire NATO budget. So comparing our military spending to all of these other, presumably more peace minded nations, when our spending is basically providing defense for their countries, is a bit ridiculous.

Then complaining when someone suggests that we'd maybe like to see them foot some of the bill for their own nations defenses instead of just milking the US for it, just doubles down on that ridiculousness.

Edited, Jul 11th 2018 8:02pm by gbaji
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#1508 Jul 11 2018 at 9:01 PM Rating: Decent
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lolgaxe wrote:
On one hand, three years is a bit much to leave a vacancy, but on the other this administration doesn't have any problem with leaving vacancies in the first place, but on the other hand it's not exactly outside the realm of possibility that the world will survive with how we're trying to get everyone to hate us ...


Wait! How many hands do you have?

Folks comparing the scenario with Scalia's vacancy and this one are really twisting stuff IMO. A mid term election and a presidential election are two pretty radically different things in terms of impact on SCOTUS picks. Yes, I suppose you could speculate that if the GOP were to lose the majority in the Senate then it would impact who Trump might pick, but unless the Dems are thinking in terms of failing to schedule a vote for any pick he puts forth for an additional two years (which puts them squarely into massively hypocritical territory), they're going to have to go forward at some point anyway.

And from a pure rules point of view, the GOP had control of the Senate in 2016 and thus had the power to delay considering a pick. Um... They also have control of the Senate now, so they could also choose to do so, but... um... why? I'm reasonably certain that if the Dems had held control of the Senate in 2016, they would not have hesitated to go forward with Obama's pick for court replacement, so it's somewhat silly to demand that the GOP do so now.
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#1509 Jul 11 2018 at 11:16 PM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:
It's also incredibly over simplistic to just say you're "for" or "against" NATO.

Laying the groundwork to apologize for Trump. Good, good. I bet you didn't even realize you were doing it Smiley: laugh

I haven't bothered much with the SCOTUS appointment because it's obviously going to be whoever Trump picks (well, now we know who) since there isn't any realistic way to block it. Stuff about how McConnell should delay until after the midterms is just keeping people riled up and reminding Democratic voters that this is happening because they didn't get out there in 2016.

The next obvious step will be that the next Democratic president & Congress will start packing the courts. Republicans will howl but all the norms were already blown off the table with McConnell refusing to hold hearings on Garland and then abolishing the filibuster for SCOTUS nominees. There's no gentlemen's rules left and no way to prevent court packing aside from a Constitutional Amendment that'll never pass. Roosevelt didn't have luck with it but that's because we still operated with a system of governmental norms and "fair play" back then.

Edited, Jul 12th 2018 7:47am by Jophiel
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#1510 Jul 12 2018 at 1:03 PM Rating: Good
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Jophiel wrote:
Roosevelt didn't have luck with it but that's because we still operated with a system of governmental norms and "fair play" back then.
Come on, some people don't stick to strict party lines because they have principles and if someone they hated were to be nominated they'd totally vote across lines.
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#1511 Jul 12 2018 at 8:03 PM Rating: Good
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Jophiel wrote:
gbaji wrote:
It's also incredibly over simplistic to just say you're "for" or "against" NATO.

Laying the groundwork to apologize for Trump. Good, good. I bet you didn't even realize you were doing it Smiley: laugh


My statement is true regardless of who happens to be president.

Quote:
Stuff about how McConnell should delay until after the midterms is just keeping people riled up and reminding Democratic voters that this is happening because they didn't get out there in 2016.


I don't know if past actions have as much impact on voter participation as current ones though. McConnell delaying the vote in 2016 had the effect of mobilizing conservatives to go out an vote (and many to hold their noses and vote for Trump just to avoid Scalia's seat going to a presumably far more liberal Obama pick). One can argue that this was at least one of several factors to Trump's victory. The same can't really be said in a midterm, and especially if the selection and appointment has already occurred by election day.

You may be giving voters more credit for far forward thinking that I do though. I just don't know if "OMG! Trump appointed a replacement for Kennedy and there might be another one in the next two years, so we'd really better get out there and vote for Democrat Senators to prevent that future hypothetical from happening" works. Especially considering this same fear is used in every single election cycle anyway. I can't remember an election (midterm or presidential) in which the "We must vote Democrat or Roe v. Wade will be overturned!" isn't used as at least part of the election rhetoric. That is kinda already baked into the election cake IMO.

If the issue was immediate with a significant shift in who might be appointed sitting right in front of the voters as a consequence of their votes? Sure. But that's not going to be the case here.

Quote:
The next obvious step will be that the next Democratic president & Congress will start packing the courts.


What do you mean "next step"? The Democrats have been doing everything they can to do this for at least the last 30 years. The use of the court system as a means to push forward their socio-economic agenda has long been a key element to Democratic strategy. It's not like Obama hesitated to put a couple pretty hard core liberal activists on the court when he had the chance (admittedly, Kagan less than Sotomayor). He was replacing justices already associated with the Left though (Souter and Stevens), so it had little impact on the court.

Quote:
Republicans will howl but all the norms were already blown off the table with McConnell refusing to hold hearings on Garland and then abolishing the filibuster for SCOTUS nominees. There's no gentlemen's rules left and no way to prevent court packing aside from a Constitutional Amendment that'll never pass. Roosevelt didn't have luck with it but that's because we still operated with a system of governmental norms and "fair play" back then.


I think that some people on the Right made this observation when the Democrats started using the "nuclear option" for appointments in 2013. Arguably unnecessarily and for extremely short sighted reasons.

Edited, Jul 12th 2018 7:03pm by gbaji
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#1512 Jul 12 2018 at 8:06 PM Rating: Excellent
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If you don't know what court packing means, that's fine, but maybe you shouldn't be talking about it then.
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Belkira wrote:
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#1513 Jul 13 2018 at 7:20 AM Rating: Good
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Jophiel wrote:
If you don't know what court packing means, that's fine, but maybe you shouldn't be talking about it then.
And while we're making completely impossible requests I'd like Photographic Reflexes.
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#1514 Jul 13 2018 at 8:39 AM Rating: Excellent
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Looks like NATO learned from North Korea on how to deal with Trump. Let him babble on, give him a noncommittal {jennifer-lawrence-okay-yeah-sure.gif} then do whatever you want after he leaves and declares massive victory.

Edited, Jul 13th 2018 9:41am by Jophiel
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#1515 Jul 16 2018 at 10:06 AM Rating: Good
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I finally found this:
https://everquest.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=4&mid=1305567729147314097#23
reaction to the public news....

Me in 2011 wrote:
Donald Trump isn't running for president. I actually don't simply feel 'nothing' for this statement. When I first heard the news, for how could I not have heard it even if I had taken a trip visit some Sub-Saharan tribe no doubt I would overhear some old men teaching their children in wild gestures and strange languages about Donald Trump isn't running for President, it actually gave me the same emotional sensation that I get when I accidentally look a person who is walking their dog outside and the dog is dropping a massive mud monkey on the ground. It's awkward, it's disturbing, but all in all I just don't care.


Oh Kelvy... you poor simple naive fool...... HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAH
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#1516 Jul 16 2018 at 11:22 AM Rating: Good
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You should look for some of the comments about how horrible he would be and how much some people thought he'd be corrupt and their principles wouldn't allow them to even think about voting for him.
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#1517 Jul 16 2018 at 12:07 PM Rating: Excellent
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Man, Trump really raised the bar for "Useful Idiots" today. I mean, you could be a 19 year old college kid in a Che Guevara shirt demanding nationalized health, education and control of the energy industries and you could still honestly say "Yeah, but I'm not a tool of Russia like Trump".
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#1518 Jul 16 2018 at 1:25 PM Rating: Good
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This is getting really sad. This is just one step above the president getting down on his hands and knees and sucking Putin's ****. It wouldn't surprise me at all if that was what comes next. I can see the comments defending him now: "So much for the tolerant left!"
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#1519 Jul 16 2018 at 4:00 PM Rating: Excellent
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Trump today made Chamberlain look like a pillar of public strength and resolve.
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#1520 Jul 16 2018 at 4:43 PM Rating: Decent
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Well, at least he got to play with his new ball.
#1521 Jul 17 2018 at 7:54 AM Rating: Good
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There's no collusion! My best friend and most innocent man in the world told me so!
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#1522 Jul 17 2018 at 7:57 AM Rating: Excellent
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Turin wrote:
Well, at least he got to play with his new ball.


Sure, he went in with none and came out with one, so he's calling it a win.
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#1523 Jul 17 2018 at 8:14 AM Rating: Decent
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You all are getting Russian classes in your high schools now right?
#1524 Jul 17 2018 at 9:07 AM Rating: Excellent
Meat Popsicle
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Well we would be but can't afford to hire new teachers. Thankfully one of the students has a grandpa in Glazov, so we just have the kids get on a webcam with him while he screams drunken insults for 45 minutes.
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#1525 Jul 17 2018 at 10:06 AM Rating: Excellent
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All of our Russian Language Program funding was spent on AK-47s for Kindergardians.
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Belkira wrote:
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#1526 Jul 17 2018 at 10:58 AM Rating: Good
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Those are better for playtime in the sandbox, anyway. M4s jam if you so much as sneeze near them.
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George Carlin wrote:
I think it’s the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately.
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